Mission Statement - Monroe County Sheriff's Office

Letter from the SheriffThe past year - my second year as Sheriff - saw manychanges in the Monroe County Sheriff's Office, all ofthem good ones. I've truly enjoyed being Sheriff. Ibelieve we have the most professional law enforcementagency in the State of Florida and I'm proud of all thepeople who work here, and who work hard every day tokeep it that way. That's easy to say, but the proof is inthe results we see from our work every day. In 2010, wewere proud to be reaccredited on a state and nationallevel. This agency is state and nationally accredited inLaw Enforcement andstate accredited inCorrections. The healthcare we provide in ourdetention center is alsonationally accredited.This means we are heldto a higher standard,and are regularly andextensively inspected byoutside entities to makesure we are holding tothose standards in ourday to day operations.Obtaining, and thenmaintaining accreditationis not easy. Only asmall percentage of lawSheriff Robert P. Peryamenforcement agencies inthe country can say theyhold the same status we do. More proof of our professionalism:major crime in Monroe County continues todecline, as it has consistently for the past 20 years. In2010 we saw an8.5% decrease in the number of majorcrimes that occurred here. Even better: We saw a 17%decrease in violent crime. These numbers come from theFlorida Department of Law Enforcement, the stateagency which tracks such statistics.We are working hardon some of the goals I personally set when I first tookoffice. I feel strongly that we should be working harderto reduce recidivism in our jails, particularly for our militaryveterans. To that end, we have applied for grantswhich will help us set up new programs to target them.Using drug treatment and education I believe we canmake a difference when it comes to rehabilitating someof our jail population. We have a number of programswhich target those who show signs they can be helped,including a culinary program which helps inmates toobtain the necessary certification to obtain food servicework when they are released. We also have a work releaseprogram which allowsinmates to get an outsidejob while they are in jail.They are paid for theirwork, and the moneygoes either to requiredrestitution payments, orto help their families.When they are released,many keep their jobs,facilitating their entryback into society. Wehave drug treatment programswhich have beenvery successful in teachinginmates how to stayaway from drugs oncethey are released.We strive every day tosave taxpayer dollars byseeking alternative sources of funding for our agency.Wehave obtained almost $2 million in grants to help fundmany different parts of our operation; we generated $1.2million dollars from the rental of jail bed space to federalagencies and, to top it all off, we returned almost $2 milliondollars to the county in unused funds from the2009 - 2010 fiscal year.We have become a green agency, implementing anagency wide recycling program which is not only goodfor the environment, saves thousands of dollars a year forMonroe County Sheriff’s Office Annual Report - 20104